On the upside, my birthday is on the 23rd, so if all goes well, I should have some adorable fluffy little newcomers just in time!
She's adorble!
welcome to the hatch a long you set your eggs just about when i set my eggs mine are do the 21st when are yours do this is also my first time incubating im gonna go in to lock down on the 18th cant wait but just like you said it is going to drive me crazy but i hope your hatch goes well good luckI'm a bit late to the party, but as my eggs were set on Jan. 1, I'd love to join in! Incubating 5 bantam mix eggs. We have Silkie, Cochin, D'uccle and Japanese hens, but the eggs look like they came from several of the cochin girls, or *maybe* a silkie- too large for the littler girls.
This is my first time hatching with an incubator- was given a MagicFly/Janoel for Christmas from my chicken-loving father-in-law. All 5 eggs are developing nicely. I, on the other hand, am driving myself crazy checking the temp and humidity every ten seconds and taking careful notes on each egg! I'm already dreading how lock down will drive me crazy.
Yes - meee tooo!!! In my early days of hatching I could not, FOR THE LIFE OF ME, understand how I was getting chicks pipping, masses of fluid and dead chicks when I followed the "hatching instructions" to a "T"!! It was only when I read a "Dry Hatch" thread that things made sense to me for a Florida Hatch. We have extremely high humidity, so without any water at all I am getting 40% in the bator. Where are you based Cynthia12?Just catching up, maybe someone already answered. Most incubators come with directions as to what temps and humidity to use. Most will say to keep humidity in the mid 50's. Dry hatch doesn't necessarily mean no humidity at all, but using a whole lot less! Especially in the beginning. . . Use around low 20's to low 30's. Remember, the first couple of days, those eggs are going to be losing a lot of moisture themselves. The humidity will fluctuate at first. So, I usually only start with the 20's range. Helps especially with shipped eggs, as those air cells are already compromised, there may be a lot that will have high sacs. Having the humidity up high, will allow them to keep rising even higher. Also, on temps. Trying to keep that temp in the range that is suggested? If for some reason, those temps go up, which can happen easily with the still airs, then those eggs will be highly compromised too. Better the temps lower than suggested, than getting too hot! The temps will also change, like the humidity when the eggs are first put in, so, dont...tweak that still air bator. Have it running the day before, set around 100... for still airs ...usually the ones with fans have a set temp. No tweaking. I am using one of those for this set of eggs I just got. I had it running last night. I had the humidity in the 20's, and since it's already set for temp...I lifted the lid a few times during the morning until the eggs felt warm. Didn't want them warming up too fast..Again, my 2 cents, and what works best for me here.
A little of everything - LOL!!!!
No, just a little joke. My breeds are definitely driven by egg colour, which is my obsession - when I look at my little egg basket, oh the joy of all of those different shades of yumminess!!! What I will advise, if you are going to continue to hatch regularly, is choose one or two breeds and breed them well - you can always make barnyard mixes but I think it's really awesome when we band together to keep the breed standard stock. How about silkies? They are the cutest things!
